Articles for Things to Do

Mirror Lake is a popular, easy destination for Yosemite visitors any month of the year. Decades ago a wagon road brought tourists up to a boathouse and saloon on the shore of this small pool on Tenaya Creek. A newer paved road then brought cars up to a parking lot; now it’s bikes and pedestrians...

The Park Service has just announced the planned re-closure of the Big Oak Flat Road that connects Highway 120 to Yosemite Valley. The closure starts Wednesday February 29 and will last 6 weeks, with the road opening before Easter weekend. The shut down is for construction to repair severe roadbed...

Once in a lifetime! The remarkably dry winter of 2012 in the Sierra Nevada has created unheard-of experiences for Yosemite visitors. The high-country corridor of Tioga Road is open to vehicles later in the season than it’s ever been in history, and people can access the summertime playground...

Whether you’re skiers or not, you owe your family a visit to Yosemite in the winter. The park is uncrowded and it’s beautiful – it’s as if there’s a second entire Yosemite in the snowy, quiet time of year. It’s true that many people are headed to ski (or learn...

Delaware North is hosting a couple of fun New Year’s Eve celebration packages in Yosemite Valley and there’s still space available for you to start off 2012 in a special way. There is an Ahwahnee Hotel package that includes either a two- or three-night stay, a formal portait sitting, a...

Off of the Glacier Point Road is a lesser-known gem of Yosemite hiking destinations: the top of Sentinel Dome. If you’ve seen the view from Glacier Point itself, then you know it’s one of the most astonishing landscape views on earth, with thousands of acres of bare granite and thousands...

There are just a couple of weeks left for Half Dome hiking; the park trail crew de-rigs the cables for winter afer Columbus Day weekend. An overnight backpacking Wilderness permit or a Half Dome day-hiking permit is required for any hiking ascent to the summit. There’s a lot of demand for a small...

After being closed for a month for safety upgrades, Yosemite’s grand hotel, The Ahwahnee, is reopening on St. Patrick’s Day. Visitors will again be able to stay in the hotel’s historic rooms and enjoy meals in its great dining room. Outside the Ahwahnee, the floor of Yosemite Valley...

The Village Store in Yosemite Village is the park’s biggest and most diverse outlet for groceries and park souvenirs. About half of the store is a small version of your basic grocery store, the other half is t-shirts, knick-knacks, and miscellaneous Yosemite paraphernalia for visitors. Among...

Rather than join the weekly winter parade up I-80 from San Francisco to Lake Tahoe, and knowing the weather was likely to be unseasonably warm, making for less than stellar skiing conditions, my girlfriend and I headed to Yosemite to experience the joys of the park, sans summertime crowds.
Fearful of...